Zuckerman tells us that “nonbelievers in God as a group come in fourth place after Christianity (2 billion), Islam (1.2 billion), and Hinduism (900 million) in terms of global ranking of commonly held belief systems….Between 500 million and 750 million humans currently do not believe in God.” [Ibid., pp. 55 and 61]

He also argues that “high levels of organic atheism are strongly correlated with high levels of societal health.” [Ibid., p. 61] The least religious countries are better off than most of the religious countries. Atheist countries have a higher life expectancy, lower infant mortality, less crime, fewer suicides, fewer homicides, higher literacy, less poverty, greater gender equality, better health care, and so forth. Sam Harris states the obvious about all of the data: “religion is the most important guarantor of societal health. They also prove, conclusively, that a high level of unbelief need not lead to the fall of civilization.” [Sam Harris, The Moral Landscape: How Science can Determine Human Values, p. 147].